Philosophy of education

The word philosophy comes from two Greek words: filo, which means love, and sophist means wisdom, then philosophy means love of wisdom. The philosophy of education examines the goals, forms, methods, and meaning of education. It is important to understand how philosophy and education are interrelated in order to become the most effective teacher you can be, you must understand your own beliefs while at the same time empathizing with others. Let's start to learn more about the known philosophies of education.

1- Essentialism: It advocates training the mind with what is essential. I n this philosophical school of thought the aim is to instill students with the essentials of academic knowledge enacting a back-to-basics approach. It teaches the basic skills or the fundamental Rs such as reading, writing, arithmetic, and right conduct. 

2- Perennialism: Perennial means lasting for many years. Perennialism is the belief that schools should teach ideas that are everlasting. The of education is to teach students to think rationally and develop minds that can think critically. The curriculum is a universal one, what teachers teach are lifted from classic and great books. The classroom is teacher-centered, with students engaged in Socratic dialogue or inquiry sessions to develop an understanding of history's most timeless concepts.

3- Progressivism: This is the idea that education comes from the experience of the child. It aims to develop learners into becoming enlightened and intelligent citizens. They use the curriculum that responds to students' needs and that relates to their personal lives and experience. The teachers employ experiential methods, and they believe that one learns by doing. 

4- Existentialism: It focuses on individual's freedom to choose their own purpose in life. The main concern of existentialists is to help students understand and appreciate themselves as unique individuals who accept complete responsibility for their thoughts, feelings, and actions. Students are given a wide variety of options from which to choose.

5- Behaviorism: It focuses on the acquisition of new behavior based on environmental conditions. Behaviorists are concerned with the modification and shaping of students' behavior by providing for a favorable environment since they believe that we are a product of our environment. Teachers teach the students to respond favorably to various stimuli in the environment.

6- Constructivism: It says that people construct their own understanding of the world through experiencing things and reflecting on those experiences. Constructivists aim to develop intrinsically motivated and independent learners equipped with learning skills for them to construct knowledge and make meaning of them. Students are taught how to learn, and teachers provide students with data or experiences that allow them to hypothesize, predict, manipulate, pose questions, research, and invent. 

Motivation and learning

Motivation is the extent to which you make choices about (a) goals to pursue and (b) the effort you devote to that pursuit. We want our students to share our enthusiasm for our academic discipline and find courses so compelling that they willingly devote their hearts and minds to the learning process. As a teacher, we should provide opportunities for students to choose ways to learn at least occasionally will improve their motivation. Furthermore to work toward making the tasks more intrinsically motivating by tapping students' pre-existing interests through choices and only resorting to extrinsic rewards for things that are important but just not interesting. 

There are several different views of motivation. They do not necessarily conflict with each other but rather complement each other. 

1- Behaviourism:  it is known as the stimulus-response theory, where a particular stimulus provokes a particular response. Behaviourism lays emphasis on external rewards (grades, test scores, please the teacher,..)

2- Expectancy theory: motivation is a function of expectations and values. the learner is motivated by the anticipated benefit, the likelihood of achieving the benefit and the importance of the gain to the learner.

3- Needs theory: Lower order needs must be satisfied before higher-order ones, progress through the hierarchy from lower to higher fulfilments.

4- Self-perception: The value of pupils having influence over their learning, performance, and a sense of accomplishment, as well as receiving rich and constructive feedback, is emphasized by self-worth and self-esteem.

5- Learned helplessness: Learned helplessness is linked to a lack of control over one's learning; it happens when we believe there is no answer we can make to a circumstance that will affect the outcome, even though we put forward our best effort.

6- Social theory: In social theories of learning, cognitive, behavioral, and environmental influences constantly interact to foster motivation and learning, not least because students model their learning after observing other students.

 

Steps that I would establish to create a businesslike classroom

A businesslike classroom refers to a learning environment in which the students and the teacher conduct themselves in ways that achieving specified learning goals takes priority over other concerns. 

Establishing a Businesslike classroom even starts before my meeting with the class. Instead of hoping, I will plan for a favorable beginning by preparing different types of learning activities, by going to the classroom and design it to best equip my needs along with conducting discipline rules and routines where students should have a background of some, and I will take the advantage of students attention afforded to me to know what kind of teacher I am and display the standards of the class.

Second, I need to know my students in order to better display withitness. Making conversation with each student, then taking information about his/her personality, noticing how each one acts and responds to several questions I have prepared. Thus I will be able to easily detect classroom events and take into consideration the important discipline problem first.

The third one to establish such a classroom is to be highly prepared. The more I put effort in a lesson or the whole subject, the more the students will be engaged. Such as a well organized syllabus at the beginning (can be presented as a video): will inform the students of all the ideas they are going to benefit from; the organization keeps their attention; I will use it as a point of focus for returning students to be on-task. 

Definitely, in order to have an active learning environment, I need to minimize transition time. I done that by integrating several strategies: Integrating technology to enhance student learning; saving time with intra-class grouping, where students are subdivided into individual task groups for a learning activity; Accommodation Students Who Complete Work at Different Time by preparing extra activity to be submitted next day, but who finished the first activity earlier can take advantage of and starts with homework, so they will remain on-task; saving time while distributing material and giving directions. 

By following the steps above I will get a comfortable, nonthreatening, and safe learning community where students are engaged, active learners, participating with rules and discipline and respect each other.

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What can I do now that I was not able to do a year ago

Because of Covid-19 and the lockdown, I am able now to attend classes from my home, my bed with my hot coffee. now, I can work and learn at the same time because everything becomes online. Online learning gave me the chance to watch the recorded sessions at the time I want without being obliged to attend the class and instead I can do my job. No paper courses, all of them are saved on my desktop, without losing any course or at least I can ask for and get it at the time without waiting for the next day to copy it from my friends. know all need to implement technology in learning, in work, in all things, thus we will have a society that has improved knowledge about technology and how to use different applications and platforms. Online learning facilitates the integrating of educational games in an efficient way, and take advantage of it and enhance the learning progress of pupils.

Challenges I face when learning or teaching online

Online learning is new to students and teachers in Lebanon so it took time to switch from face-to-face learning to computer-based training in a virtual class because of their adaptation for years to conventional learning. Some students may face electricity and net problems when learning online and you know we are in Lebanon. Problems may be faced because of devices that may be too old to obey the course management system and lack of devices if there is more than one student in one house. Computer literacy is a major problem among today's students where most of them are unable to use basic programs and solve basic computer problems because they lack expertise in this field. Self-motivation is an important aspect of online learning but many ignore it and give up because the challenges of navigating a technical medium seem insurmountable. 

How to avoid problems when teaching online

Covid-19 changes learning from on-ground to online. In teaching online, students must be independent and must prepare an atmosphere that emphasizes their responsibility for their own learning. Goal orientation is necessary to complete their work and collaborate with their peers and know how to use tools to catch information easily. Online learning requires the use of computers, so students must be taught basic computer skills to communicate with teachers and friends. 

These are some tips for enhancing online teaching:

• post a recording for the session
• open your camera during the session (eye contact)
• use videos for illustration and make them short 
• give instructions
• provide interactive activities (integrate educational games)
• use group communication (with the help of many applications and websites)

How to be a digital citizen

A digital citizen is someone who has acquired the skills to successfully use the internet and digital technology, and who does so in a responsible and acceptable manner in order to engage and participate in society and politics. To be a digital citizen, first you should make a good digital impression by spreading positive vibes and must always be courteous and encourage others to be nice, too. Second, you should avoid contents that are sexually provocative. Finally, you shouldn't steal the ideas of other people and mention the reference in case you used the words of others.